Permaculture applied to landscape design integrates each space with its regional & cultural context. This minimizes ecological impact while maximizing utility, aesthetic value, and quality of life. "Permaculture is revolution disguised as organic gardening" Graham Burnett Permaculture  A Beginners Guide Learn Permaculture in Philippines & 40 poor farmers learn Permaculture free! 72 hour accredited Permaculture Design Certificate (PDC) Course 1-13 Nov in Cebu City. "Permaculture is a holistic approach to landscape design and human culture. It is an attempt to integrate several disciplines, including biology, ecology, geography, agriculture, architecture, appropriate technology, gardening and community building." Guy Baldwin The course's teacher is Greg Knibbs (www.edge5.com.au), from Australia- Greg has regularly teaches with the father of Permaculture, Bill Mollison, and has ongoing projects with communities, non-government organizations and private companies in the Philippines, West Africa, Cambodia and Australia. Over the last 30 years Greg has worked in the Environmental field and his expertise lies in Permaculture, Earth Restoration, Education and Design. Enrol now online! http://www.permacultureph.org/enroll.html Course Fee Php37,500 (or about US$875 depending on the exchange rate on any given day)- DISCOUNTS of up to 15% AVAILABLE FOR EARLY REGISTRATION! EVERY enrolled student in this PDC WILL ENABLE Permaculture Action Asia to teach Permaculture to 40 below poverty line beneficiaries FOR FREE in 2011 and set up 9 Permaculture demo sites Cebu province wide! Like us on Facebook: www.facebook.com/permacultureph Subscribe to our Twitter feed: www.twitter.com/permacultureph PDC 1-13 Nov in Cebu City, Philippines Permaculture Design Certificate Course Held over a period of 12 days, the curriculum for this course is based on subjects covered by Bill Mollison, widely regarded as the father of permaculture, in his book Permaculture: A DesignerÂs Manual. "Though the problems that face the world are increasingly complex, the solutions remain embarrassingly simple." - Bill Mollison, Father of Permaculture The course includes:  Introduction to Permaculture  Methods of design  Pattern understanding  Climate  Trees & their energy transactions  Designing against disaster; fire; drought  Soil  Water  The humid tropics  Dry lands stragies  Humid cool to cold climates  Aquacultures  Earthworking & repair  Effective aid  Right livelihoods  Village development Php37,500 Course Fee DISCOUNT AVAILABLE! Discounts for early payments or early deposit of Php12,000. Reserve your place early and receive a discount on full fee: Receive the following discounts on course fee if deposit or full payment made before- 15 Aug 2010 receive 15% Discount- Php31,875 Total 31 Aug 2010 receives 10% Discount- Php33,750 Total 15 Sep 2010 receives 5% Discount- Php35,625 Total The balance of your course fee is due before the course starts. "It is our collective responsibility to protect and nurture the global family, to support its weaker members and to preserve and tend to the environment in which we all live" - Dalai Lama ABOUT CEBU CEBU was ranked third best island in Asia recently by New York-based travel magazine Travel + Leisure. Travel + Leisure magazine recently released the results of the survey, which covers hotels, airlines, cruises, islands and cities all over the world. http://www.travelandleisure.com/worldsbest/2010/islands/asia-islands/23 Only a few minutes away from the city are numerous white sand beaches, crystal blue waters, and swaying palms, making Cebu a perfect destination for both business and leisure. Mactan Island is a coral island and famous scuba diving and beach site. It is also the site of the Export Processing Zone. Malapascua Island is endowed with white sand beaches and crystal clear waters, and the west coast is ideal for swimming and snorkeling. The sleepy little market town of Moalboal was one of the first places where scuba diving caught on in the Philippines. From here, you can dive straight off Panagsama Beach, which is home to an extraordinary array of coral, anemones, sponges, and a swarming host of brightly colored reef fish. Olango Island, 20 minutes from the airport in Cebu supports the largest concentration of migratory birds found in the country. These birds migrating from Russia stop here en route to Australia. See more at http://www.cebucitytourism.com/aboutcebucity.html "What Permaculturists are doing is the most important activity that any group is doing on the planet" Dr. David Takayoshi Suzuki- World renown Japanese-Canadian academic, science broadcaster & environmental activist. ABOUT US Permaculture Action Asia is a brand new non-profit social enterprise focused on Permaculture. We provide free Permaculture courses and distribute seeds and plants to low income beneficiaries. This program will start Jan 2011 Cebu province-wide, and from 2012, is to spread around Region 7, and from 2013, Philippines wide. Permaculture Action Asia manages 8 Permaculture demonstration sites (opening 2011) located around Cebu province. Our flagship demo site, Cebu Eco-Culture Club, showcases the 5 zones of Permaculture in a 64 hectare Cebu City site, and houses 40 beneficiary families as a model eco village. ENROL NOW online! http://www.permacultureph.org/enroll.html Hi there, We are a NGO in Philippines looking for volunteers on our eco farms (permaculture) . The volunteer opportunity is- After a 2 weeks permaculture course/orientation, Volunteers would work on the Permaculture demo sites and with below poverty line beneficiaries on their own sites. Alternatively, also in our head office in admin/clerical, marketing, IT or other capacities depending on skills of volunteers. -- JENSEN GO CHOW B Business/ LLB Executive Director Permaculture Action Asia, Inc. "Solving the World's Problems in a Garden" www.PermaculturePh.org www.facebook.com/permacultureph www.twitter.com/permacultureph www.youtube.com/permacultureph http://www.linkedin.com/companies/permaculture-action-asia-inc.?trk=copro_tab "Permaculture is revolution disguised as organic gardening" Graham Burnett ÂPermaculture  A Beginners Guide Unit 2, Ground Floor, Josepha Arcade, Sergio V. Lim Building General Maxilom Ave, Cebu City 6000, Philippines Phone: +63 (32) 412 4076 Fax: +63 (32) 231 7537

The success I saw with trap crops for FB was in a commercial broccoli field of about 45 acres, the grower had a problem with the transplants getting badly infested with the little buggers soon after planting. It wasn't that the grower couldn't control them with insecticides, he was simply looking for a more economical way to do it. as a crop consultant I suggested he try a field with a border strip of radishes that he could easily spray with the pesticide he chose that he knew would work to kill the FBs. Just outside the field was cover for the FBs to overwinter in and as expected, they first emerge on the south face of the north end of the field. He sprayed the radishes, which were up before the broccoli was planted at very little cost to him, and had very little FB pressure on the transplants for about 6 weeks. Ordinarily, those 6 weeks would have absolutely required spraying in his way of dealing with the situation to keep the FBs from seriously damaging the crop. A partial success in that the project kept him from doing 2 sprays over the entire field and pointed him into a different way of looking at pest control which he was willing to do.

We're alike in our limited ability & low budget. I have big ideas to garden, but after illness garden smarter nowadays rather than harder. At least in theory. Try to focus on the basics... ... build soil where actual plants will go rake soil up to make mounded beds & paths will be lower then don't walk on the mounded beds & you won't have to till them cover paths with the wood chips (eventually they decompose & you can rake them back on top of mounds) cardboard or newspaper over any weedy areas then with your compost (plus alfalfa & rabbit manure) on planting beds & wood chips on paths If you end up with a lot of material you can "fill" the paths with the wood chips inbetween the mounded raised beds. I've done that inbetween some areas on a slope where we built it up next to our gravel driveway. Soaker hoses on top of the mounds & used cut wire coat hangers to hold in place. Add Y connectors to soakers, so I can turn on one at a time with hose to faucet. In another garden at our camp we divided the raised beds into 2' planting beds with a 2' path between since they were 6' wide & much too wide to reach across for us much less children. Wood chips are still there 2 years later though have sunk down. Top isn't composted and no mixing into the soil on sides. We laid soaker hoses then covered those beds with landscape fabric & cut holes for plants. Kept the hole area covered with mulch. Seed bank of weeds was extremely high, so that was workable for us with limited time there. Have planted 2 years in the holes & mulched. Will try to get a 2nd year out of that same set up as mostly a display garden in full public view & much easier for us to manage with our other jobs at camp. I spent less than 1 hour a week there once planted during growing season only. More time when planting. After mulching in fall leave until early spring before weather warms to be sure weeds aren't reestablished. If weeds, remove perennial & add more mulch sometimes more newspaper, then mulch plant wide rows rather than single rows seems like it takes as much time to prep wide rows as singles & you get about 4x the plants in the same space interplant short season crops with longer time in the ground as well as root crops with above ground (lettuces with onions, cabbages with radish, carrots with radish or broccoli) Square foot gardening (SFG) has planting suggestions for how to plant what crops in a single square foot of soil. Easy for kids to help plant as you poke with fingers after you have your square foot areas marked. Also easy for busy people. Just plant when you can & easy to get back to plant another square instead of a whole row. SFG method says one 4' x 4' square per person for eating fresh & plant more area if preserving. Maybe even divide garden up into these 4'x 4' squares & let each family member tend that area. Cover the rest with cardboard plus the wood chips & let it be. Mow the outer area to keep weeds at bay. The weeds do blow in. If the creeping charlie comes in from the surrounding grassy area have family cut in with the shovel to make an edge & then at 45 degree again for a trench. Weeds will be easier to pull if they cross that trench & easily spotted. Drag a hole through the trench at an angle from standing position 2x in growing season -- as early in spring as you can while daffodils are still blooming and again in mid summer. Should be fine in fall, but could do again. Hope that helps, Corrine

Scott: I was really impressed with that articles proclamation of all they're doing to help the farmers. Allowing them to bale hay from the conservation sites? That's impressive knowing the sentiment of conservationists. I had no idea of all the back up waterways and isn't that just nice. Probably not enough, though. But the interest rates and availability of the loans - while nice - concerned me as I know we really cannot afford it unless they have some time of reserve built up for them. Note: I really don't care if we can afford it or not. A need is a need. George; I couldn't agree more. From my point of perspective (way below the poverty level) permaculture is the only solution until such time we are not allowed to work the land: a topic for another forum. Thanks for the link. I'll give it a ear. I'm still for Hugelkulture as much as I can stand to dig. bon